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European Commission To Issue Apple An Irish Tax Bill of $1.1 Billion, Says Report (reuters.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: The European Commission will rule against Ireland's tax dealings with Apple on Tuesday, two source familiar with the decision told Reuters, one of whom said Dublin would be told to recoup over 1 billion euros in back taxes. The European Commission accused Ireland in 2014 of dodging international tax rules by letting Apple shelter profits worth tens of billions of dollars from tax collectors in return for maintaining jobs. Apple and Ireland rejected the accusation; both have said they will appeal any adverse ruling. The source said the Commission will recommend a figure in back taxes that it expects to be collected, but it will be up to Irish authorities to calculate exactly what is owed. A bill in excess of 1 billion euros ($1.12 billion) would be far more than the 30 million euros each the European Commission previously ordered Dutch authorities to recover from U.S. coffee chain Starbucks and Luxembourg from Fiat Chrysler for their tax deals. When it opened the Apple investigation in 2014, the Commission told the Irish government that tax rulings it agreed in 1991 and 2007 with the iPhone maker amounted to state aid and might have broken EU laws. The Commission said the rulings were "reverse engineered" to ensure that Apple had a minimal Irish bill and that minutes of meetings between Apple representatives and Irish tax officials showed the company's tax treatment had been "motivated by employment considerations."
So the EU can just come down and tell it's member countries who they are and aren't allowed to give tax breaks to. This would be an interesting ruling though as ANY tax breaks would become illegal in the EU and thus there would be no viable way for companies to keep their business in the richer EU countries.
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This would be an interesting ruling though as ANY tax breaks would become illegal in the EU and thus there would be no viable way for companies to keep their business in the richer EU countries.
Umm, what? If they are paying taxes it's because they are profitable. Tax avoidance like Apple is doing is the difference between profits and more profits. You don't get taxed when you are losing money. Companies that are profitable now in "richer EU countries" would remain so, just to a lesser degree. Anyway the EU is a monetary union and there are rules relating to the flow of money within a monetary union. Just like the US being a part of the EU means that countries have given away some sovereignty in exchange for economic benefits. That's not necessarily a bad thing.
Not if they are rich and powerful enough. If Hillary hasn't showed you that, then you're an imbecile.
Yes, but if by some magic process of having my brother, who is a foreign resident, send me an invoice for "services rendered" or "brand licensing", and I paid this invoice and claimed back all of the the tax I'd otherwise need to pay on the expense, when all my brother is doing is holding the cash on my behalf in a low-tax jurisdiction, then we'd have a situation akin to what's going on with Apple, Google et. al.
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Appeal or not, the writing is on the wall, Ireland and it's theft of revenue from other countries, crippling their social services is over and Ireland will be fucked and forced to ensure all companies pay equal fucking taxes. No fucking special deal to steal other countries revenues, there should be far greater penalties applied to Ireland for this blatant scam and the economic attack on other countries.
All taxes should be paid where the revenue is generated, and not one cent of tax revenue should be allowed to be stolen by other countries. The Irish government are scum for doing this and should be made to economically suffer.
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I don't think the words "morally" and "taxation" belong in the same sentence. No matter how you think a society should be run, the forced confiscation of private property using a threat of violence is not moral. I am not proposing an alternative, but a lack there-of does not make extortion in any way "moral".